Bowen Bulletin

Most communities fall into one of two camps. Either – we’re being overrun and need to enact policies that will curb undesirable development or – this town is dying, we need to attract some business. Bowen doesn’t really fit into either group. We’re considered in the wider world to be a suburb of metro Vancouver. Provincial and federal economic development initiatives deliberately exclude us and we’ve never had a very coherent strategy for attracting business so one could assume that we must be deliberately trying to discourage it.
From time to time somebody gets a grant from somewhere and does some advertising to attract customers to our local B&Bs and restaurants, but advertising existing businesses and trying to attract new ones are two entirely different things. Another misconception is that building houses without creating economic opportunities for the people moving into those houses is building community, when in fact all that you are doing is building out a suburb. A third red herring that gets thrown into this debate is that you can build a viable economy based on retail and service businesses. While those of us in these sectors welcome more customers we should realize that without some form of primary or secondary industry, we will always lack the core support that an integrated economy supplies.
So the first decision we have to make is whether or not we actually want economic development on the island. Our current development pattern has half our workforce getting on the ferry every morning to go to work off island. If we continue to actively discourage opportunities to develop businesses on Bowen we can expect that percentage to continually increase. I believe that many Bowen Islanders don’t have any problem with that scenario. They see Bowen as a high-end, low-density residential enclave and would like to see it stay that way. Their only fear is that the ferry will become too expensive or too crowded or both.
The other possibility is that we could revise our Official Community Plan and municipal policies to move away from our anti-business bias and give entrepreneurs an opportunity to set up shop on Bowen. Most people don’t realize how difficult it is to set up a new business here. There is virtually no land zoned for light industrial use other than the highways yard, the recycling depot and the building centre. While a number of businesses and workshops operate out of residential properties it is not a development strategy that will move us forward. The commercially zoned property is either fully developed, waiting for that sewer expansion that we keep hearing about or is unbuildable because of a lack of parking.
Let’s imagine for a moment that we would like some employment-generating businesses that did not depend upon an even greater number of new commuters. The questions become – who do we want and how do we attract them? The obvious answers revolve around tourism but the very nature of that industry creates seasonal fluctuations that change the character of a community. While a recent survey indicated that most of us are OK with the current number of tourists, not many were thrilled with the idea of ever greater numbers.
If we look at our population by age we see that the group we have the least of is the 25 to 34 year olds. This would be a good group to attract to bring energy and young families to our community. Since we can’t offer jobs with large companies or the government, we would have to look towards more entrepreneurial types. While we have enjoyed some success with this group in the construction industry the one group that might fit here that we haven’t gone after is the green collar worker. These are our kind of people. They like quiet, pollution free places, they don’t like long commutes and they love the idea of raising their children close to nature and away from the paranoia that accompanies urban living. They like the idea of working in a shop or office that is planned to minimize its carbon footprint, with consideration given to eye friendly lighting and fresh air. They are attracted to or start small, innovative firms that buy locally and sell globally. Their products range from new ways of growing algae to nanobots.
I’m not pretending that we know how to attract these businesses. Like all development initiatives that depart from existing growth patterns, there is a bit of a trick to get all of the pieces to fall into place and get some early successes, but it’s certainly not too early to start trying. With our Official Community Plan update process getting under way, I’m hopeful that we will start to look at community growth and development through a lens of long term economic growth. We can put into place land zoning and municipal policies that will make us attractive to fledgling green businesses and move us towards sustainable growth patterns.